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Bringing the crack since December 2003

Amazing Spider-Man #655

Color me surprised, as this is the second time in a row that a BND issue was pretty good. I guess my final opinion hinges on how the next issue turns out, but overall, I thought this was a very solid effort in terms of writing and art and definitely one of the better issues of the BND era by far.

Anyway, the issue deals with the aftermath of the fridging of Jonah's wife, Marla. The bulk of it is a dream sequence in which Peter is reminded of all the people who knows who has died during his tenure as Spider-Man. I was actually impressed with the actual continuity here as we see a lot of dead characters from years ago...for example, Nathan Lubensky, Aunt May's former lover is there as well as Charlie, the girl Spidey accidentally killed during the Spider-Man vs Wolverine one-shot. I'd like to post some of these pages, but there's no way I could post just four and get the effect across to you. There's some interesting presentation here, with one two-page spread looking like something out of a M. C. Escher painting.

Basically, it brings up how Spidey doesn't kill people, with his villains chastising him and blaming their victims' deaths on him for not having the courage to kill them.

At the end, Spidey runs into the burglar that killed Uncle Ben. Spider-Man decides to take matters into his own hands, and beats the burglar into a bloody pulp, when...

The issue ends, however, with a hostage situation in which a new villain kills one of his hostages before the police even have time to negotiate. He says that he has he has no regard for human life, and if they don't do everything he says, they're going to have a massacre on their hands (he puts emphasis on the word 'massacre', so I'm guessing that's his name).

So basically, and what's gotten the internet riled up, is that a lot of people are saying that this issue is leading up to Spidey breaking his "no-kill rule" and that he is going to kill this guy next issue. I personally don't think it'll get that far, but if it did, what would you think?

I don't think that's what fridging is about, though? Although at this point I'm not really sure of the definition myself.

Because there's nothing inherently wrong with fictional characters dying "pointless" deaths. Secondary characters, background characters are killed off all the time in violent stories. If a security guard is killed by the Joker, that's not really a fridging, yeah? So hate crimes are a terrible analogy for this, because authors don't typically kill off their own characters out of racial / misogynistic hatred.

As I understand it, the point of WiR is to show how many of these secondary, background characters were disproportionately women, and how the characters their deaths were intended to motivate were overwhelmingly male. It's less about, "oh no, women are being killed," but more about how women's roles are marginalized and used to prop up men instead. The imagery of a woman in a refrigerator was just a dramatic phrasing to attract attention to the issue. So I don't think it's possible to really discuss the topic outside the lens of institutional prejudice.

well Secondary characters is too broad. its really more characters that are close to "Hero" a wife, brother, sister, lover, partner, sidekick ect. a character that has a close tie to the hero. it started just as women but has been expanded to gays, and other minorities. but it is as you said, an attempt to "prop up" a hero or "Show how bad a villain is" at the expense of the loved one (who more often than not is Female)

truth be told though, i don't think there is A DEFINATION for Fridging anymore...the definition has changed and evolved over time but i don't think those changes have been noted. people cry "Fridge" or use the "race card" anytime something negative happens, and that is not always the case.

back on topic. with the changes that have been made, its more of a case by case basis now. ( it hink)

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